


Dog Days

by flaming_muse



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Feelings, Gen, Humor, Humor With Feelings, M/M, Post Season 2, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-29
Updated: 2012-12-29
Packaged: 2017-11-22 20:59:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,891
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/614271
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flaming_muse/pseuds/flaming_muse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stiles has always wanted a dog, so he should be happy when he finds himself suddenly in possession of one, right?  Unfortunately, it’s more complicated than that.  Or, the one where Derek is turned into a puppy.</p>
<p>pre-slash set after season 2, no spoilers for season 3</p>
<p>warnings for humor, all of season two, repercussions of canonical deaths, brief panic attacks, lots of adverbs, and Stiles hitting his head a few times</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dog Days

**Author's Note:**

> This story is dedicated to Stoney, who gently pimped me the show, not-so-gently squeed with me as I watched it, and told me to tell the story I wanted to tell instead of the one I thought I should when I found myself with words in my head.
> 
> It is a Stiles-centric Stiles/Derek friendship/pre-slash fic (with a potential properly slashy sequel poking at my muse) with ensemble cameos, set after season two with no spoilers for season three. Humor with feelings. HWF. Kind of like a PWP, only with 100% less porn, and you’re actually supposed to laugh when it gets awkward and you want to cover your eyes.

_It starts like this..._

“Ow,” Stiles says, pressing his hand to his forehead where it had hit the wall. He’d been tossed against it by the explosion/flash of light and smoke thing and he thinks also Derek trying to push him out of its way to safety, if safety is slamming into a big, hard, kind of slimy (now that he looks at it closely) brick wall. “Ugh.”

“Is everyone okay?” Scott asks in the middle of the now quiet alley. He has his human face on again, and he looks clean and perfect - if confused - in the midst of swirling smoke under the half moon. His shirt is on, which even Stiles has noticed is kind of rare at the end of a fight.

“Where did it go?” Jackson calls from the far end of the alley.

“Ow,” Stiles says again as he pushes himself up to his feet and his shoulder protests the movement. His shirt does, too, or it would if it was alive and could see the grossness of the wall it was rubbing against. "I'm good. You know, for some definition of good that includes alive but possibly concussed. So pretty much normal."

“Allison?” Scott asks, turning around in a circle.

Jackson stalks toward them, his claws retracting into his fingers. “Where did that thing go?”

“Big puff of smoke?” Stiles suggests and illustrates the idea with a wave of his hands. “Cackling laughter? ‘And your little dog Toto, too’?” Jackson just looks at him. Stiles drops his hands in defeat. “The witch vanished, dude.”

“Allison!” Scott calls, growing frantic, his eyes beginning to glow.

Speaking of glowing eyes... Stiles looks around. “Where’s Derek?” He’d been right next to the witch.

Allison appears from around the end of one of the big brick buildings, crossbow in hand.

“Allison,” Scott says with relief, starting toward her.

“I’m fine,” she says and walks by him without acknowledging him. “She didn’t get out past me.”

Scott visibly deflates, moping down to the very toes of his sneakers. Stiles would be sympathetic, except that the best way to weather the ups and downs of Scott and Allison is not to get dragged into every second of it. Also:

“Hey, where’s Derek?” he asks, craning his neck around to look in every direction as they all meet up in the middle of the alley.

Jackson shrugs. “He was going for that thing before it did whatever it did.”

“Dis-apparated,” Allison tells him. She looks around, too. “I don’t see him.”

“Derek?” Stiles calls.

“Maybe he followed it,” Jackson says.

“Into _thin air_?” Stiles replies, starting to grow worried. "That would be a new one, even for him.”

“Did he get hurt?” Allison asks. She takes a step toward the darker side of the alley, like he might be licking his wounds in the shadows. Which, hey, werewolf, so maybe he is.

“Bored seems more likely,” Jackson replies.

“I think she was chanting something at the end,” Stiles tells her. His heart begins to pound as he realizes what that might mean. "It sounded like Latin."

Allison’s eyes widen. “Magic?”

“Derek!” Stiles calls, spinning in a tight, desperate circle. Derek might be creepy and more than occasionally aligned with the Dark Side (a.k.a. Peter Hale), but he had been _right there_ by Stiles and now he’s _gone_ and -

“Hey, look, a puppy!” Scott exclaims.

 

_Actually, it starts like this..._

“Allison hates me,” Scott says, slumped in the passenger seat of Stiles’ jeep as they drive toward Scott’s house.

“I’m sure she doesn’t _hate_ \- “ Stiles begins, and then there’s a big flash of light and some seriously crazy laughter, and Stiles is fighting to keep the car on the road.

And then there’s a lot of scrambling, the suspicious deaths of a few innocent townspeople, a lot of trying to avoid Stiles’ dad, Derek climbing through Stiles’ window at two in the morning with a huge gash on his arm, some useful information, and a glowering and grudging request for help, and a big fight with a witch in an artfully lit dark alley.

And _then_ there’s the puppy.

 

_So there’s a puppy..._

The puppy is mostly white, with dark tips to its ears and splotches on its back and around its sort of familiar greenish eyes. It is sitting just at the edge of the shadows by a dumpster, watching them.

“What is that?” Jackson asks, narrowing his eyes at it.

“A puppy!” Scott says excitedly. He starts slowly walking toward it.

“I think it’s a Husky,” Allison says, tilting her head. At least she isn’t pointing her bow at it.

“Why is it just staring at us?” Stiles asks, and he gets this awful, awful feeling in his stomach.

“Aren’t dogs freaked out by werewolves?” Jackson asks.

“Hey, boy,” Scott says, offering his hand to the puppy. It just sits there and looks at it. “That’s weird. Jackson’s right. It should be freaking out... or at least reacting in some way. It just looks... kind of annoyed.”

The sick feeling in Stiles’ stomach gets worse.

“Is it hurt?” Allison asks.

Scott shakes his head. “I don’t think so. I don’t smell any blood or anything, and it isn’t being aggressive or cringing away.”

Allison gets closer, and the puppy continues to look at them. “That’s really weird.”

“It’s just a dog,” Jackson says dismissively.

The puppy stares directly at Stiles at it lets Scott touch its head.

“No collar,” Scott says. “But he doesn’t seem scared of people.”

Stiles is pinned by those bright eyes, and his feet carry him step by step over toward it, as much as the rest of his body is screaming that this isn’t happening. This can’t be happening. This is not happening.

“He’s very cute,” Allison coos, and the dog’s eyes bore even more deeply into Stiles’.

Stiles’ heart sinks further. This is totally fucking happening, isn’t it.

“Can we go?” Jackson asks.

“We can’t just leave him here,” Scott says, his hand protectively on the dog’s back. “It needs our help.”

“It’s just a dog,” Jackson says.

“It’s a _puppy_ ,” Scott snaps back.

Jackson rolls his eyes. “It’s - “

Stiles kneels down on the ground in front of the dog and asks - oh, god, he wishes he didn’t have to ask this question, he can’t believe he has to ask this question - with despair and resignation rolled into one, “Derek?”

The puppy thwumps its tail on the ground, once.

 

_The ensuing conversation is chaotic, lengthy and loud, but the important part is this one..._

“We can’t leave him here!” Scott says, curling a little more over the dog.

“It’s not Derek. It’s a _dog_ ,” Jackson tells him.

“We don’t know,” Allison says softly, her eyes large and liquid as she watches Scott hovering so sweetly beside the puppy. “And it wouldn’t be the weirdest thing we’ve seen if it’s true.”

“Oh my god,” Stiles says, pacing randomly in an eight foot circle as he rubs his head and tries to think. Think, he has to think, somebody has to think. “Oh my god. This _isn’t_ the weirdest thing. I mean, okay, turning somebody who can already turn into a dog - wolf - “ He corrects himself automatically before anyone objects. “ - seems kind of counterproductive and lacking in basic imagination, but it’s not the weirdest thing, you’re right. It is so far from the weirdest thing.”

“We need to figure out how to fix this,” Scott says. “We need to take him home.”

“It’s a _dog_ ,” Jackson says again, more angrily. “You want it fixed? Take it to the vet.”

“Jackson!” Scott says, his voice rising.

“We don’t _know_ if it’s Derek,” Allison says. “But if it is, we need to help him.”

“Okay. Okay.” Stiles stops pacing and comes back to stand in front of the dog. He crouches down and tells himself to be calm, because they don’t know anything yet. They can’t freak out until they know something. Then, if it turns out that Derek has been turned into a cute fuzzy puppy instead of a werewolf who can actually help protect the town - and them - from all of the craziness that keeps hitting them from all sides, _then_ they can freak out. “Derek, if that’s you, we need you to do something Derek-y. Something only Derek does. So we know for sure that it’s you.”

The dog just looks at him, unblinking, for a long minute.

Frustrated and bordering on horrified at the very real possibility of what’s in front of them, Stiles bursts back up to his feet and flails his hands in the air as he goes back to pacing. “Yeah, I don’t know, fuck, that could totally be Derek.”

The puppy sighs at him.

 

_This part of the conversation is important, too..._

“ _I_ can’t take it!” Scott says. “My mom will kill me!”

Stiles thinks Scott’s mom is more likely to ask a few empty questions, look at him mournfully, and then wander off, but he’s known Scott a long time. There’s no point in arguing with him when he has that kind of panicked tone in his voice.

“But you’re a werewolf,” Stiles argues with him, anyway, because just because he might know when he should stop doesn’t mean he ever does. “You’re strong and fast and probably get urges to pee on every tree you walk by. You’re the best one to take care of him while we figure this out.”

“I can’t. My _mom_ ,” Scott says.

“If my dad finds out...” Allison says when Stiles turns to her.

“Yeah, _right_ ,” Jackson scoffs when Stiles turns to him.

“What about Lydia?” Stiles says, desperate. “Lydia likes dogs. She _has_ a dog. So he’d have a friend. That would be great. Derek needs friends. Lots of friends.” He thinks about it for another second and covers his eyes with his hand. “God, no, she’d probably carry him around in one of those stupid dog bags like Paris Hilton, and he’ll tear all of our throats out when he gets back to normal, and it’s not like we could even blame him.”

When he looks up again, the three others - and the dog - are looking at him, waiting for what is obviously the only solution, because Stiles has to solve everything, unless the problem requires fangs and/or supernatural strength and/or terrifying relatives, in which case they’re on their own. “Fine,” Stiles says with a huge sigh. “I’ll take the dog. How much work can it be?” Then he smacks himself on the forehead, right where his new bruise is. He flinches back in pain. “Ow, I can’t believe I just said that, what the hell is wrong with me?”

 

_So Stiles finds himself in possession of a dog who is maybe, probably, most likely Derek Hale..._

As it turns out, Derek - as Stiles is calling the puppy, because it’s easiest, even if it’s kind of a stupid name for a dog... but it’s kind of Schroedinger’s dog at this point, maybe a dog, maybe Derek, nobody can say for sure, and as cool of a name as Schroedinger would be Stiles just sticks to Derek so that Scott isn’t confused - isn’t actually much work at all. He sits quietly in the back seat while Stiles drives home, does his business quickly at the edge of the dark yard, and is silent and still as Stiles carries him up the stairs to his room.

And as soon as Stiles makes a little dog bed out of one of his blankets Derek-the-puppy goes over, sniffs them a little with disdain, and sits down like he owns the place. Much like the real Derek does most of the time when he’s in Stiles’ room, so there’s another point in the ‘it’s Derek’ column.

“Okay,” Stiles says, pacing a little and rubbing his hand over his head. “Okay. I am going to go put on some pajamas, which I am so not doing in here with you watching me even though you seem to have no problem with public partial nudity, and then I’m going to get some dinner, because I am starving.” He paces back toward the dog, who is - of course - watching him. “Are you going to be okay? Not that - Okay, fine, I don’t even know if you understand me, I’m probably talking to myself here, but - “ He crouches down in front of the puppy and looks right into his weird-for-a-dog-colored eyes. “I will be back in like five minutes. Please try to stay quiet. My dad is at work, but it’s good practice, okay?”

Derek-the-puppy makes what sounds like a put-upon sigh and settles down on the blanket.

“Okay. Good.” Stiles stands up, stares at him for a minute, and careens out the door to find non-slime-covered clothing and also food.

Six minutes later he is back, clothes in the wash, sweats and a t-shirt on, and a microwave pizza and a soda in hand.

He is relieved to see that the puppy is in the same place. Derek-the-puppy’s eyes track him as Stiles sits down at his desk, and his nostrils flare as Stiles takes a big bite of his pizza.

“Hot, hot, ow,” Stiles says, gulping a mouthful of soda to cool the greasy burn of cheese against the roof of his mouth.

The puppy looks unimpressed.

Stiles takes another bite of pizza, and the dog mournfully puts its head down on its front paws, watching the movement of Stiles’ hands as he lifts and lowers the slice.

“Oh, hey,” Stiles says, realizing that he may have forgotten something really important here about animal care. “You’re probably hungry, huh. Big night, lots of running, possibly being turned into a dog by a crazy witch with really bad teeth. I can pick up some dog food tomorrow, but - uh, yeah, no, no dog food, that’s probably really insulting to a werewolf, sorry, only you’re - “ He gestures at the _dog_ in his room. “I mean, if you’re just a dog then that’s fine, but if you’re really him then please don’t rip my head off or something when you get back to normal; obviously I will not feed you dog food until I am sure, because if you’re Derek you’re not a dog. I mean - “ He gestures to him again. “ - you’re kind of a dog, but if _I_ were turned into a dog I sure wouldn’t want to get back to normal and have dog food breath. So, uh, what I’m saying is - “ He pulls a piece off of his dinner and holds it out with a jittery hand to Derek-the-puppy. “Pepperoni pizza?”

The dog sniffs the offering, then snaps it up in its sharp little teeth and eats it.

“Cool,” Stiles says, breathing out in relief. He feels like he just dodged a bullet, and he actually has experience doing that now. “Okay, cool.”

They eat in relative silence - the puppy is silent, anyway, and Stiles rambles at it without paying much attention while his mind runs a mile a minute with all of the different things they’re going to have to do to figure out what’s going on - and the throbbing ache in Stiles’ head from its little meeting with the wall makes him decide that research can best wait until the morning.

So when he’s done, he goes to get a dish of water for the puppy, bids it an awkward goodnight, turns off his lights, and climbs into bed. His shoulder hurts nearly as much as his head, but he just can’t gather the strength to get up and find painkillers.

Two minutes later, he’s just drifting off to sleep when a compact bundle of muscle and fur lands on his chest and breathes pepperoni-breath right against his face.

“Gah!” Stiles cries, flailing under its weight. “I said I was sorry about the dog food thing! Please don’t kill - “

But the dog doesn’t go for his throat or maul him in any way. It just licks at his bruised temple, then turns around three times and flops heavily on his sore shoulder.

“Hey, watch the - “ Stiles begins, but he stops when he finds that the dog lying there doesn’t actually hurt. In fact, the warmth against his muscles and the brush of soft fur against his face are kind of nice. Really nice, actually. Really kind of amazingly comforting and nice and -

Stiles wakes up the next morning so refreshed that he doesn’t even mind the fur in his mouth.

 

_Everything is still confusing, though..._

“What are we going to do about Derek?” Scott asks as they watch the puppy romp through the grass at the deserted park. Stiles has deputized him to help with daytime puppy care.

“I don’t know, dude,” Stiles says, rubbing a hand over his face. “We don’t even know for sure it _is_ Derek.” He doesn’t know which way he wants that question to be answered, really, because Derek being a dog or just being missing are both problems, but he’d _really_ like to know which it is. He’s exhausted just thinking about all of the possibilities.

“It has to be,” Scott says. “Right? I mean, what other explanations are there?”

“I don’t know, like a million?” Stiles replies with a sigh. He doesn’t really mind being the brains of the operation, god knows somebody has to be, and it’s not like he has anything else to offer, but it would be nice if sometimes he had a little help with it. “I’m just saying, it’s hard to imagine big, broody Derek Hale chasing leaves like that.”

The puppy leaps up in the air, snapping at a leaf being spun overhead by the wind. His tail wags like mad when he catches it in his teeth, but when he barks out his joy the leaf flies away again. Derek-the-puppy barks again and dashes after it.

“Yeah, that can’t be Derek,” Stiles says, which is both a relief and a burden, because a) he doesn’t have to try to figure out how to turn Derek back into his usual self but also b) he has no idea what happened to Derek at the end of the fight, which can’t be a good thing. And obviously c), which is that he is sheltering a secret puppy that cannot stay with him.

“I don’t know,” Scott says slowly, smiling at the dog’s antics. “I mean, he’s a puppy, right? Puppies are young, kids. Maybe this is what he was like when he was a kid. You know, before the fire.”

Stiles thinks about that for a minute, because he hasn’t given a lot of thought to what Derek must have been like as a child. Scott’s right, though, in that perceptive way he is sometimes, that Derek probably wasn’t all dark and menacing as a kid. He’d just been... a kid, a regular kid if you discounted the werewolf thing, until his whole family was killed. That would obviously change a person. Stiles knows that personally; nothing’s felt the same at all for him since his mom died, and he still has his dad. Hell, he still has his _house_.

He tries to imagine how much harder everything would be if he didn’t. Even just dancing around the idea makes his heart hurt and his blood run cold with loneliness.

“Huh,” Stiles says thoughtfully as Derek-the-puppy barks his delight and bounds after a butterfly.

“We need to help him,” Scott says.

“Yeah,” Stiles replies.

 

_And so Stiles starts to come up with a plan..._

Dividing and conquering seems like the best idea, and besides, Stiles is spending way too much time driving home to take the puppy out and/or feed him and/or make sure he hasn’t destroyed his room or alerted his dad to his existence to be able to do it all on his own.

Somehow, even though he’s not a werewolf, he ends up being the one to talk to Isaac. He’s still not sure how that happened, but he corners him in the stacks in the school library as soon as he can.

“Hey, so, do you know if Derek’s okay?” Stiles asks him.

“I haven’t seen him in a few days,” Isaac replies, pulling a book from the shelf and looking at its table of contents.

“That’s kind of my question,” Stiles says, rocking back and forth on his heels. “Can’t you just - “ He lowers his voice and waves his hand around in a way he hopes signifies something mystical and awesome. “ - _feel_ if he’s okay? Or if he’s not? Or maybe if he’s liking the food he’s been eating recently and/or wants to rip his bed into shreds because it’s not comfortable enough or something?”

“What?”

“Never mind. My point is, he’s your Alpha. Can’t you tell how he is?”

Isaac puts the book back and levels a flat look at him. “I’m a werewolf, not a psychic. I have no idea.”

Stiles sighs and wishes he had longer hair so he could tug at it. “‘Damn it, Jim. I’m a doctor, not a forklift,’” he mutters to himself. He blows out a breath. “Great, thanks for your help or lack thereof.”

“You are seriously weird,” Isaac says as Stiles turns and walks away. “And covered in dog hair.”

“Tell me something I don’t know,” Stiles calls back, lifting his arm and giving him a sarcastic wave before he turns out of view.

 

_Of course, Scott doesn’t do much better..._

“Deaton doesn’t know,” Scott tells Stiles over the phone that night. “I mean, he said with witches and magic anything is possible, but he’s never heard of anything like it, really.”

“Okay,” Stiles says, scratches Deaton off of his mental list of people who might be able to help, and scratches Derek-the-puppy between his ears where he sits beside him quietly on the bed. There’s a certain way Stiles has learned to do it that makes Derek’s eyelids droop with pleasure. Stiles smiles when he sees it work yet again.

“He said he’d do some reading and get back to me,” Scott says.

“Great,” Stiles replies, his heart thumping a little in his chest as the puppy breathes out a soft sigh and rolls onto his side, his stomach full of hamburgers and fries and his tail just barely tapping out a gentle rhythm on Stiles’ mattress. Stiles rubs his hand over the puppy’s offered belly, and his tail wags a touch harder.

“You okay, Stiles?” Scott asks. “I know this is kind of... weird.”

“Weird doesn’t begin to cover it,” Stiles says, “but it’s all right. He’s only destroyed one pair of my socks, and to be fair they were from my lacrosse bag and probably smelled pretty bad.”

“Or good,” Scott says, and then he goes very, very quiet.

“Oh my god, there are some things I don’t need to know about werewolves and your perversions.” Stiles covers his eyes with his hands, and Derek-the-puppy snorts out a breath against his leg. “Shut up,” Stiles tells him.

“Sorry,” Scott says over the phone.

“Not you. Well, yes, you. You, too. I’ll talk to you tomorrow. I have homework to do. And research. And somebody here is going to need me to sneak him outside again before bed.”

At the word ‘outside’ Derek-the-puppy’s tail wags even more.

 

_And not all of Scott’s help is helpful..._

The next morning before school, Scott arrives at Stiles’ house with a hopeful smile, a truly unbelievable story for Stiles’ dad, and a backpack bursting with -

“Dog toys?” Stiles says, looking at the stuff Scott dumped out on his bed. “Really?”

Scott looks over at Derek, who is sitting stiffly in the middle of Stiles’ pillow and staring at them both like he hates everything about his life. “I thought he might be bored,” he says with a shrug.

“So you brought him _dog toys_?” Stiles says again.

“I don’t know.” Scott picks up a bone and squeaks it thoughtfully. “They looked like fun.”

Stiles gapes at him for a moment, because his best friend pretty much just admitted that his new-ish werewolfly self thinks that squeaky bones are now _fun_. Then again, Stiles himself plays on a team where they carry around sticks while they run a lot and throw and catch balls, so it’s not like he has a lot of room to judge activities that are fun for humans as well as dogs.

Scott squeaks the bone again and offers it to Derek, who sniffs it and then ignores it. Scott’s shoulders fall, like he’s disappointed he doesn’t get to play.

Okay, yes. Yes. Stiles has _plenty_ of room to judge.

“Stiles!” his dad calls from downstairs. “Time to go to school!”

“Okay!” Stiles yells back. He sweeps the toys off of the far side of his bed onto the floor, just in case his dad peeks into his room, and says, “Let’s go.”

“I hope you enjoy the toys,” Scott tells Derek, who tilts his head but doesn’t otherwise respond.

“Don’t eat my pillow,” Stiles tells Derek, and then he pushes Scott out of his room.

He and Stiles clatter down the stairs, but at the front door Stiles realizes he has forgotten his phone, so he runs back up them two at a time. He’s almost afraid to see how much damage Derek has done in the past thirty seconds since they left.

But Derek is sitting where they’d left him, looking broodily at the toys on the floor. He glances up at Stiles when he comes in, his ear twitching in question.

“Forgot my phone,” Stiles explains, grabbing it off of his desk.

Derek huffs out an acknowledgement, and when Stiles trips over the squeaky bone puts his head down on his paws.

He looks depressed. He looks frustrated. He looks like he wants to be anywhere but there.

Stiles can’t blame him for a minute. Being trapped in someone else’s room most of the day is bad enough, but he’s also trapped in someone else’s body, a body with no opposable thumbs so he can’t even surf the internet or use the remote or whatever.

Not that Derek probably spends a lot of time watching TV in his everyday life, Stiles knows. Muscles like that don’t grow themselves, and there’s all of that lurking and Alpha-ing that Derek does. Being stuck inside as a dog is never going to compare, not even with a thousand stupid squeaky toys.

It’s kind of sad and depressing to see Derek laid so low. He’s _Derek Hale_ , strong, silent, really fucking scary Alpha werewolf Derek Hale, only now he’s - Stiles is about 90% sure - a small, fuzzy, adorably cute puppy. And people like Scott are treating him like one. This is not right. This is not right at all.

He goes over and kneels next to the bed so that he can look Derek in the eye.

“I am going to fix this,” Stiles promises him. “Because this is ridiculous and unfair to you, and even though we’ve had our problems in our past and will probably have more problems in our future that include you throwing me against things and not listening to a word I have to say you seriously deserve better than this.” He flips a chewy rope thing over his shoulder in illustration.

Derek’s ears perk up, and he follows the movement with his eyes.

Stiles rubs his hand over his face; speaking of Derek not listening to a word he has to say... “I’m glad you can have some fun with this, because god knows you never do when you’re, you know, _you_. You seriously should work on that when we get you back to normal.”

Derek looks at him, and his tail thumps once on the pillow.

“I’m going to take that as a thank you,” Stiles says. He picks up the rope again, tosses it across the room, and hopes his dad just thinks it’s him leaping after it.

 

_Having a secret puppy means going on a lot of walks, and they can’t exactly be in the neighborhood..._

There’s a place on one of Stiles’ favorite walks through the woods where has to decide to turn up toward the ridge or over toward the Hale house. The burnt-out husk of the Hale house still creeps him out, but sometimes (before the dog incident) he swings past just to check on Derek, see what’s going on. Not that he ever sees or hears anything there, and with Peter back from the dead Stiles is even less interested in being found on his own in the woods, but he figures it’s better to know instead of not know if things are happening. If he’s going to feel on edge all of the time, at least he’d have a reason for it.

“Which way?” Stiles asks Derek when they crest the hill and have to choose. It’s early morning, still foggy and atmospheric, and no birds are singing nearby.

Derek looks over in the direction of his house for a long moment and then growls low in his throat before turning away toward the ridge.

“Yeah,” Stiles says, following him, “I bet you like it there even less than I do.”

But as they walk, he finds himself thinking about what it means that Derek still spends so much time in a place where his family was murdered. He wonders if being there feels at all to him like it did to Stiles when he used to hide in his mother’s closet and cry after her death long past when his father gave her clothes away, because empty or not it was still the closest he could get to her.

 

_The research continues..._

“I was talking with Lydia,” Stiles says as he rapidly sorts books out onto his desk while Derek watches from his seat by the window, “she says hello, by the way, before she made a few comments about your current state I _won’t_ repeat, and she translated this picture of a piece of a Latin codex in like two seconds after lunch, which still, wow, I don’t know how she does that, but anyway, I have a lead. At least I think I do. But I’ve got books - “ He gestures to the piles on his desk. “ - and things to look up in them - “ He waves his hand at his piece of paper full of notes and the open file on his computer. “ - and, more importantly - “ He digs into his backpack again and pulls out a two-liter bottle of soda and a plastic bag. “ - I have snacks! So we are all good. We are totally good. Definitely totally all good, especially if this lead pans out and we can get you back to your usual growly, furry, sharp-fanged self instead of this temporary one.”

Derek blinks at him, but he doesn’t look grumpy or frustrated. He just looks like he’s waiting. When he feels like it he’s a surprisingly good listener, really, and Stiles has to like people not interrupting him when he has useful things to say.

So he smiles at the dog, pulls a packet out of the bag, opens it, and offers it to him. “Jerky? It’s the regular kind; I told you I wouldn’t get the black pepper one again after the whole sneezing incident.”

Stiles jumps back in surprise when the dog lunges for the meat - though he did spring for the buffalo tonight - and he inspects his fingers to be sure they’re all accounted for as Derek takes the whole bag of jerky back to his spot.

“You really need to work on your sharing,” Stiles tells him sternly, but Derek’s only response is to hold a piece of meat with his front paws and start eating.

“Fine.” Stiles drops into his desk chair and opens a bag of corn chips for himself. “When you get the power of human speech back I’m going to expect some serious thank yous. Or at least _one_ ,” he says and goes to work.

Derek never does share the jerky, but later, much later, when Stiles is drooping with exhaustion over his desk without any answers, the dog comes over and nudges Stiles’ arm with his wet nose until he closes his books and goes to bed.

The dog, like always, curls up with him, snuffles in against him just the way Stiles likes it, and Stiles presses his face into Derek’s warm body, lets his tension out in a slow breath in a way that comes so much more easily when he’s not alone, and falls happily asleep.

 

_There are a few more days like that..._

“This is seriously disturbing,” Lydia says as the puppy bounds across the empty park toward the frisbee Scott just threw ridiculously far away with his crazy werewolf strength.

“And yet not disturbing enough,” Stiles agrees, watching Derek growl at Scott, frisbee clamped tightly in his jaws, when he approaches. It’s really cute to see Derek-as-a-tiny-dog try to dominate Scott, and it’s even cuter that Scott gives in and backs off. The whole scene is comfortable, friends just having fun with a dog, except that’s not what’s happening at all. “Which is why we need to fix it.” He picks up the next book from the blanket they’re sitting on.

Lydia makes a thoughtful noise and watches the dog for a minute longer. “I wonder what he’d look like in a sweater.”

 

_And then Stiles has a breakthrough..._

“I did it!” Stiles crows, bursting into his bedroom. He dumps his lacrosse stuff on the ground and his backpack on his bed and tears the zipper of his bag open. “I figured it out!” He pulls out his notebook and shakes it at Derek, who is sitting in a sunny spot by his pillow. The dog’s ears twitch up. “Sure, Scott said something stupid at lunch about your Alpha form that got me thinking the right way, and Jackson said something smart about lycanthropy and the moon, but I was the one who put the pieces together, and I was the one who found all of the stuff we need on the internet, and _I_ \- “ He thumps his chest in triumph and sits down next to Derek to deliver the conclusion to his amazing news. “ - I am the one who knows how to turn you back!”

Derek’s tail starts wagging up a storm, his eyes turning brighter.

Stiles brings his hand down to pat the dog’s head and says, “Two days. Two days, my friend, and then you’ll be back to normal.” The dog nudges up happily into his hand, and Stiles finds himself wondering if Derek’s regular hair is as soft as his fur.

 

_But of course, that’s not how Stiles’ life works..._

Two nights later Stiles finds himself out in the middle of the dark woods with Derek sitting in the middle of a containing circle of mountain ash - just to be careful, because his true form might be the big scary Alpha werewolf, and he might be really, really angry about Stiles totally accidentally on purpose buying him a dog sweater with a wolf on it the other day - doused in talcum powder and a bunch of weird herbs looking exactly the same as he had before Stiles did the spell to change him back into his true form.

Or tried to do the spell, anyway, because it obviously hadn’t worked. Derek is still a small, adorable, now very dirty puppy.

Stiles’ legs give out, and he sinks slowly to the ground, feeling like he might throw up. It’s disappointment. It’s despair. It’s failure. It’s probably a little bit the stupid tea he had to drink before he totally messed up doing the spell.

He rubs the heels of his hands hard into his eyes and tries to hold back the stinging behind the lids.

“Fuck,” he breathes. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

It didn’t work. Derek, who is the Alpha of the local werewolf pack and actually pretty damn useful when muscle is needed to combat the various supernatural and human crazies that seem drawn to Beacon Hills like the town is a, you know, beacon, who is both a thorn in Stiles’ side _and_ someone who has repeatedly saved said side, who is stuck in the stupid body of an adorable but mostly defenseless puppy, needs Stiles’ help, and Stiles tried, and it didn’t work. He completely failed at helping.

“Fuck,” he says again.

Stiles knows he’s pretty damn smart - certainly smarter than the rest of them, with the exception of Lydia - and he knows he’s made some lucky guesses and even luckier saves since Scott was turned into a werewolf and their lives got really complicated really fast. He knows he’s done some good.

But he also is smart enough to know how far out of his depth he is, which is really fucking far. He’s a kid, and just a regular one. He doesn’t have super speed or sharp teeth. He doesn’t have eyes that flash fun colors or nails that grow into razor-sharp claws. He doesn’t have a heart of gold that leads him to making the right choices all of the time. He’s just a teenager, just a guy, and he has no business being the one trying to help his supernatural friends, because he sucks at it. He’s not brave. He’s not some brilliant magic user. He’s not a math and languages savant with bite immunity like Lydia or a super awesome archer with werewolf hunting in her blood like Allison. He’s just Stiles, fumbling and unpopular Stiles Stilinski, and he’s in way, way, way over his head.

He might get lucky sometimes, sure, but he just _sucks_ at this. When he sits back and thinks about it instead of diving in feet-first, he doesn’t know why he’s even trying. About the only thing he’s reliably good at is falling over, talking too much, and/or being bait. Sometimes he can even do all three at once.

Turning an Alpha werewolf back into himself is totally out of his wheelhouse.

Despondently, Stiles reaches out and breaks the circle of dust with his foot. “Come out if you want to,” he says to Derek. “There’s no point sitting there waiting for a big zilch to happen.”

Derek stares at him, not blinking.

“I wish I could say that was creepier when you do that in your human face,” Stiles tells him, “but honestly it’s still creepy.” He tries to sound confident or at least unworried, but he can’t quite fake how he can’t take a breath because of the weight on his chest. He presses his hands into his eyes again and says, “I’m sorry. I’m trying, I am, but I’m...” _Not good enough, not a hero, just faking it and hoping somehow I’ll make it in the end even though I’m surrounded by people who are stronger, faster, and better than I will ever be..._ “Sorry. I won’t give up, I’ll try to get more help, I’m not going to leave you like this, but I’m...” He waves his hand to finish the sentence.

He hears soft footsteps, and a tiny, self-loathing part of him hopes it’s some hungry rabid werewolf ready to finish him off and put him out of his misery.

Instead Derek pads over and nudges Stiles’ downturned face with his snout. When Stiles jerks his head up, surprised, Derek licks his cheek.

“Thanks,” Stiles tells him when he recovers from his shock and scratches the puppy on the scruff of his neck before he starts to gather up the remnants of the spell.

 

_And so Stiles continues to be in possession of a ridiculously cute puppy-slash-werewolf..._

It’s surprisingly easy keeping a dog in the house without his dad knowing. As sheriff, his dad can work weird hours, and he and Stiles have this growing barrier of awkwardness and lies between them that for once is actually useful even if it still makes Stiles feel like he has a fist stuck under his rib cage when he thinks about it. So his dad isn’t around much and doesn’t poke his head into his room the way he used to when he is, and Derek has the sense to stay quiet and disappear when his dad does come into Stiles’ room.

And it’s not like leaving pillows and odd dishes with snacks on the floor is anything new for Stiles; he’s a teenage boy, after all.

Stiles doesn’t even mind taking care of Derek all that much. He has always liked going for walks in the woods, and since Scott is pining for Allison a silent furry companion is a nice contrast to a moping one. Stiles is spending most of his allowance on food for Derek, but with Lydia back with Jackson he returned all of those presents for her - except for one bracelet, which he still thinks he might give her as a “thanks for being generally awesome and for saving Jackson, even if that means you’re never going to fall in love with me” gift - and so he has the extra cash. And Derek always seems happy to sit next to him on his bed while he watches movies on his laptop or reads a book. It’s pretty cool, actually.

Besides, growing up, Stiles always wanted a dog, someone to play with and be friends with him even when Scott was busy or in his own house at night, and this might be as close as he’s ever going to get.

Sometimes, when he’s falling asleep with Derek a warm, soft, snoring presence against his side, Stiles wonders if this is what being friends with Derek would have been like, if only they’d met without there being werewolves and murdered families and slamming of Stiles into things. It has that same comfortable ease he does with Scott, that same give and take (even if with the puppy it’s sometimes the give and take of yanking on his favorite sneakers), and that same level of reading each other’s minds so that they both go for the door at the same time or turn left instead of right without talking about it... only when he’s trying to talk his way through a problem he found in his research Stiles doesn’t have to explain himself in small words like he sometimes - often - does with Scott, because he’s pretty sure that Derek is following him, even if he can’t contribute to the conversation. He doesn’t look confused, anyway, as he sits there and watches Stiles pace.

He isn’t positive, though, because Derek is still a dog, and Stiles hasn’t been able to help him. He’s not sure if he will be able to before his options run out and he’s left with nothing else to try and a tiny, angry werewolf on a leash.

It wakes him up at night, the dread of that failure, and the only thing that keeps him in his bed instead of pacing around his room is the weight of Derek’s head tucked so trustingly against his ribs. He doesn’t want to disturb Derek, and he doesn’t want to give up the little comfort he has, himself.

The sun is a bright spear of unwelcomeness in Stiles’ eyes a few days after the failed spell. He’d been up very late researching, and every cell in his body screams for more sleep.

Instead he gets a wet nose on his hand and an inquiring whimper. When Stiles doesn’t do more than groan, Derek does it again and then licks him a little.

It’s so wrong.

“Don’t be nice to me,” Stiles mutters morosely. “We all know the second I get you your perfectly sculpted abs back you’re going to go back to hating me, not listening to me, and occasionally heroically jumping between me and something that wants to kill me. Don’t pretend you aren’t.”

Derek is silent for a moment and then nips at his hand. It isn’t hard, but his teeth are sharp enough to startle Stiles upright.

“I did ask for it,” Stiles says with a sigh and makes himself face his day.

 

_Scott, of course, misses the point..._

“I don’t know,” Scott says. “Would it be the worst thing? I mean, he seems happy.”

Stiles watches Derek romping through the leaves as they hike up to the ridge to check out whatever smell Scott had found there. Stiles isn’t sure what help he’s going to be, but it’s not like Scott is good at figuring out this stuff on his own unless he has a detailed road map or a really stupid hail Mary of a plan he decides not to tell anyone about, that anyone including, say, the guy whose teeth he decides to use to bite someone, not caring about the ten tons of baggage, guilt, and history the teeth owner is already carrying. Or, oh, including his supposed _best friend_.

Pushing down his still-present anger about being left out of the loop, even if he was kind of the one not answering Scott’s calls, Stiles turns his thoughts back to the conversation at hand. Derek _does_ seem happy snuffling through the ground cover and chasing a bird or two, but obviously he’s happy. He’s a dog.

“It wouldn’t be the worst thing if we can’t find a way to turn Derek back?” Stiles says in disbelief. “He is a puppy, Scott. A fluffy, snuggly, adorable, pint-sized - well, gallon-sized - Husky puppy.”

“Yeah?” Scott says, half a question and half like he thinks Stiles is agreeing with him.

“Would _you_ be happy as a dog?” Stiles gestures at him and then rolls his eyes. “Oh, who am I kidding? You probably would be. No more Allison troubles, no more tests you can’t pass. You could just run around all day chasing balls and licking yourself.”

Scott thumps him on the shoulder with the back of his hand, but he doesn’t actually argue. Of course he doesn’t argue; Stiles is right.

“And anyway, it’s not like all of our problems have magically gone away,” Stiles reminds him. “There’s still the Alpha pack, there’s still Peter, there’s still Gerard, wherever he went.”

“I don’t know,” Scott says with a shrug. “We haven’t seen any of them. It’s been really qui-”

Stiles doesn’t need supernatural speed to get his hand over Scott’s mouth before he finishes that word; he has the intense rush of panic and fear that has become so familiar to help him. “Do not say that,” he tells Scott, staring hard into his confused and slightly wounded eyes. “You know better. Don’t you know better? Do _not_ tempt fate like that. It isn’t quiet. It isn’t peaceful. It is a lull at best. A temporary lull. It is probably a lull with, like, scary music in the background getting louder and louder as danger approaches, only we can’t hear it because we’re the main characters in the movie and don’t know what’s coming. So _do not say that it is quiet_ , Scott, because that means the music is going to get really loud and so is the screaming. Lots and lots of screaming.” Trying not to think too hard about screaming and bloodshed and people dying, he watches Scott’s eyes some more. “Do you understand me?”

Scott nods behind his hand, and when Stiles reluctantly lets him go says, “I’m just saying that maybe without an Alpha here things aren’t so... busy. Maybe it’s having a pack around that’s part of the problem.”

Stiles sighs and rolls his eyes, because seriously, Scott is the _worst_ at not tempting fate. “Not busy? Remember the witch?”

Derek scampers across the path in front of them, his tail wagging furiously as he leaps over a fallen branch toward a squirrel, which flees up a tree.

“Nobody got seriously hurt,” Scott reminds him.

Stiles stabs his finger a few times toward Derek, who might not be bleeding but who is a _dog_. “Just because we’ve had a week without someone’s throat being cut - “ He flings his head back in frustration with himself. “ - damn it, I suck at the fate-tempting thing, too - doesn’t mean it won’t happen. And now we’re down one big, strong werewolf, because he sure isn’t going to be able to do much unless we’re going up against weresquirrels or something.” Stiles watches Derek bare his teeth at the chittering squirrel and finds himself wondering, “Wait, _are_ there weresquirrels? Because that would be both awesome and terrifying.”

“I don’t know,” Scott says, and that’s part of the problem. Scott might have a good heart, but there’s still so much he doesn’t know, and it’s not only about chemistry.

They need Derek. He needs to get back to normal for his own happiness, but they also just need _him_ , because he fucks up a lot, too, and there’s a ton he doesn’t know, but he has more experience than the rest of them, and when push comes to shove he isn’t afraid of taking someone down. Stiles doesn’t always think that it’s the right call, but for Scott it’s _never_ the right call. It makes Stiles feel old, and not in a good way, but he is coming to realize that he knows a lot more intimately what monsters can do at this point than Scott does, never mind that Scott kind of is one.

Stiles is collecting the scars to prove it.

Derek waits for them up at the top of the hill, sitting patiently as they climb up the rest of the way toward him. His eyes flick back and forth between them both, his ears perked forward. The breeze blows, and he snaps his head around, his nostrils flaring and his hackles rising.

He smells something, maybe the same something Scott had, not that he’ll be able to tell them about it. He can’t be much help as a dog, and all Stiles smells is something flowering that is making him want to sneeze.

“We can’t leave him like this,” he tells Scott, climbing over a tangle of roots.

“No, I know,” Scott says. “I know. I’m just saying it could be worse.”

Stiles is too far away to grab him before he gets that sentence out, but he still lunges for him and smacks him on the back of the head. “Scott! What did I say about saying stuff like that?”

“Sorry,” Scott says, laughing and rubbing his head; Stiles hadn’t pulled the swing all that much.

Stiles looks around for the harpies, hunters, or other h-named horrors (hey, horrors starts with ‘h’, awesome) that are now due to descend on them, but the woods seem quiet. They’re probably waiting for them to get complacent again before they strike. Stiles can feel his heart pounding in his throat just thinking about it, and he squares his jaw, walks faster, and tries to ignore the instinct to panic, but all he can think about is if something does happen they’re even less well equipped than usual to handle it. He needs to fix it.

“Are you okay?” Scott asks as they reach the top of the ridge. “I know you’ve been working hard on this Derek thing, and you seem a little - “

“Never better,” Stiles tells him, manages to keep upright when he trips in a rabbit hole, and is actually kind of relieved when Derek starts growling at something in the underbrush, because it means he doesn’t have to talk about his feelings.

Even better, it’s only a squirrel, and it doesn’t seem to be anything more than a regular one.

Win-win.

 

_The problem with Derek being so good at listening is that Stiles is getting used to talking to him..._

“ - and then when Lydia’s over being happy that Jackson’s back, and he gets over being a werewolf and even more stupidly strong and superior than he already was, she’ll finally see that just because he’s a dick and back from the dead doesn’t mean he’s actually _interesting_ , and she’ll open her eyes to the other, way better, way funnier, way smarter, and yet still lacrosse-adjacent options she has,” Stiles says, swinging back and forth in his computer chair with his lacrosse stick resting across his lap.

Derek, sitting on the floor by the window, looks at him.

“Hey, I’m not saying it’s the best plan in the world,” Stiles says. “It’s just the only one I have. Be her friend, let her get over this big romantic death-defying crisis, and then when things are back to more of a normal flow I can make my move.”

Derek looks at him.

“Yeah, okay, and this time I won’t yell at her or dump all of my issues on her, either,” Stiles says.

Derek looks at him.

“Come on, man, she’s Lydia Martin,” Stiles tells him, because that’s all the explanation he should need as to why he’s been daydreaming about her for years. “And did you know she’s smart? Like crazy, math genius smart?” He sighs wistfully. “Even her brain is hot.”

Derek looks at him.

“You think I’m an idiot.”

Derek just looks at him.

Stiles pushes back in his chair, bumping against his desk and springing to his feet. “No, I know you think I’m an idiot all of the time; I meant about this.” He swings the stick around in frustration. “Great. That’s just great. An emotionally constipated werewolf-turned-puppy who lives in ruined buildings instead of just getting an apartment like a normal person and who listens to his creepy - not to mention totally fucking insane - uncle, who has abandoned him and who is probably off creating metric fucktons of trouble that are going to rain down on our heads any day now...” Stiles trails off for a second, having lost his place in the sentence. He points at Derek. “ _You_ are telling _me_ that _I_ am the one making bad life choices.”

Derek huffs a breath out of his nose, scratches his ear nonchalantly, and continues to stare at him.

“You know what?” Stiles says, pacing toward his door and back again. “Nobody asked you.”

Closing his eyes, Derek puts his head down on his paws.

“Thank you,” Stiles tells him, and he continues to pace and swing his lacrosse stick until he almost takes out his lamp.

The thing is, though, he thinks, Derek is probably right, at least about Lydia. Stiles _is_ being an idiot if he thinks he’s ever going to get her. She saved Jackson with her _love_. If that’s not a ringing endorsement for forever with them, he doesn’t know what is. Besides, she’s probably safer with a werewolf for a boyfriend to protect her.

Stiles just has never been able to let things go easily.

He stands there for a minute, just breathing, trying to be smart for once. He’s not sure it works, but at least his mind stops spinning so much. He needs to focus on other things.

Sitting down in his chair again with a fwump, he drops his stick, opens his laptop, and gets back to working on the dog problem instead.

 

_At least until Stiles’ eyes get tired and his forehead hurts from pounding it against his desk so he stops reading..._

Late that night, Stiles’ phone rings halfway through an episode of _Arrested Development_.

Stiles pauses the video on his laptop, and Derek lets out one of his disapproving little puppy sighs and takes his head off of Stiles’ thigh to rest it on the bed.

“Sorry, dude. It’s Scott. He’s probably just going to moan about Allison, but he might be in trouble, and with you all puppy-fied I should check and be sure.” Dropping his free hand on Derek’s fuzzy flank, Stiles answers his phone, “There’s always money in the banana stand.”

“What?” Scott says.

“Never mind. What’s up?”

“I was just calling to check up on you. You know, to see how things are going.”

“They’re going.” Stiles rolls his shoulders on his pillows. “Going nowhere. How are you?”

“Okay,” Scott says. He clears his throat, sounding distracted and concerned in a way that makes Stiles’ pulse pick up a little. “How’s Derek doing?”

Stiles watches Derek’s eyes slide closed as Stiles continues to pet him and says with some surprise, “Good, I think.”

“Does he still seem... I don’t know, like Derek?”

“Well, he has sharp teeth and doesn’t talk much,” Stiles says. “So the answer is yes.”

“No, I mean - “ Scott breaks off with a frustrated sound. “Does he seem like _Derek_? Like he’s Derek stuck in a dog’s body? Or is that changing?”

“I don’t know,” Stiles says, his blood running cold as the dog rolls his head happily against his leg. It feels completely normal now, but if he thinks back to even a week ago he can’t imagine Derek being happy about anything. “Why?”

“Because Deaton said something tonight about how people can get stuck in other forms and forget who they are. Not shapeshifters like me, but people who use magic. That’s why people don’t do it much. And I was thinking that maybe Derek isn’t just letting his puppy side out but is, you know...”

“Forgetting himself,” Stiles finishes hollowly, looking down at the comfortable, content, companionable dog.

“Yeah,” Scott replies. “Or starting to.”

Stiles closes his eyes and thumps his head back against the headboard. “Fuck.”

“I don’t know,” Scott says, “I mean, it hasn’t been that long, but I wish we could talk to him and be sure he’s okay. You know?”

“Yeah,” Stiles says. He sits up a little; that’s an avenue he hasn’t explored. “Hey, yeah! Thanks.” He hangs up the phone, shuts down the video window on his laptop, and pulls up his browser.

Derek makes a protesting noise when Stiles pulls his hand away from him.

“Sorry, big guy, you’ll have to wait to get your George Michael Bluth fix,” Stiles says. “I’ve got more work to do. But you’ll like this one, because if I can find a way to make it work you’ll get to tell me off in your own voice. Yay?”

Derek’s tail thumps onto the bed a few times at that idea, and Stiles thinks with some hope maybe he isn’t all that far gone yet after all.

 

_So then Derek completely dashes that hope..._

“Give me back my sock!” Stiles says five minutes later, trying to tug it out of Derek’s mouth.

Derek hunkers down and gives him a playful growl, his tail wagging frantically. He pulls back, yanking the sock precious inches out of Stiles’ grip.

“I need that!” Stiles tells him.

Derek’s tail wags even harder.

“Everything okay up there?” his dad calls from downstairs.

Stiles and Derek freeze, the sock still taut between them, and they look at each other for a guilty moment before Stiles calls back, “I’m fine! I’m just fighting with my sock!”

“It sounds like it’s fighting back!”

Stiles narrows his eyes at Derek. “Sort of!”

His dad is silent for a second. “Maybe try a more peaceful approach before you wreck your room, eh?”

Glaring in dire warning, Stiles tugs again at the sock, and Derek lowers his head and releases it. “I think I’m good now!”

“Okay,” his dad says. “And go to bed before I come up and turn out your light for you!”

“You aren’t helping,” Stiles hisses at Derek. “If he comes up here, we’re toast.”

His ears drooping, Derek looks suitably chastened and hunkers down on the far side of the bed, out of sight.

He’s never seen Derek slink off before.

Stiles stuffs his sock into his drawer and tries to stop his heart from free-falling. Being with Derek is fun, it’s easy - when not fighting over food or bits of his clothing - and it’s getting really comfortable. It’s a lot of the things Stiles has always wanted in a friend. It’s more than a friend, really. Derek listens. He’s happy to see him. He might even understand some of the pressures on Stiles, because he’s lost people he loves and been thrust into a position he never wanted, too. He is a companion, almost a partner, someone by his side, happy to jog in the park or curl up in bed at night. It’s a balm to Stiles’ bruised and lonely heart.

But it’s not right.

Stiles might be almost happy, but he thinks of Derek and how he interacts with people, and this isn’t right at all.

The problem is, though, that as much as he would like to see Derek's own unfairly handsome face glowering at him, rolling his eyes, and very occasionally almost smiling at him, Stiles knows down to his bones he is going to miss what they've had here, too. He likes how close they’ve become, how safe and warm it feels to have Derek by his side. It's stupid, because if Derek is getting lost in the puppy then none of it is in any way real, but he will miss it, anyway.

 

_Cue research montage, complete with handy magic research web sites, piles of musty leather-bound books Stiles buries his nose in and later cutely dozes over, and shots of Derek sitting on the bed watching TV on Stiles’ laptop while Stiles is sitting on the floor reading (because_ Arrested Development _waits for no werewolf)..._

It takes two days, during which he sleeps less than six hours total, for Stiles to find what he thinks is a way to be able to talk to Derek. If he can’t change him back, at least he can get a better sense of what’s going on from Derek’s perspective, probably get chewed out in the process, and maybe, just maybe, get some useful advice about what the fuck he’s supposed to be doing to fix this problem. There’s probably, like, some ancient werewolf remedy or something that none of the rest of them knows about.

The irony of performing a ritual to get Derek to talk - Derek, who hates talking and sharing information almost as much as he hates wolfsbane - is not lost on Stiles. But then he is a person particularly appreciative of irony, sarcasm, and other bitter forms of humor.

A part of Stiles is tempted to wait until the next day to do it. He’s exhausted and jittery, the edges of the room blurring when he blinks his eyes, and he really wants to crawl into his bed and wrap his arms around a soft, warm friend one last time before it all goes crashing to hell.

But then everything has already crashed to hell, hasn’t it? His whole life has, one thing after another since Peter bit Scott and werewolves were real and bodies were _everywhere_ and this is his life, this is his life now, thing after thing, crisis after crisis that he just has to _deal_ with, on his own, in way over his head, when he’s not a hero, he’s not even a good son or a good friend or anything but a kid living in a world where people die and most of them aren’t going to be as lucky as Jackson and get to come back and -

Derek nudges him with his wet nose, and Stiles scrubs his hand over his face and tries to get his breathing back to normal.

“I’m fine,” he says, his voice shaking as much as his hand. He looks around, reminding himself of where he is. He’s in his house. His room. Even after everything that’s happened and the way his window has apparently turned into a dog flap for werewolves, it’s still a place of safety, a place filled with the memories of soft kisses from his mother and pats on the shoulder from his dad.

Derek nudges him again, pushing his face against Stiles’ unresponsive hand and making disapproving sounds until Stiles pulls himself enough together to pat him. The contact makes the dark spikes of panic ease away, and he feels like if he gets to his feet he won’t have the urge to run.

“Okay,” Stiles tells Derek. “I’m just going to find some stuff, and then we’re going to do this thing.”

Magic is weird. It’s arcane and oddly specific, but sometimes what it’s specific about is totally mundane. So this spell requires three unlit wax candles (which Stiles gets from a dusty box in the dining room sideboard that probably hasn’t been touched since his mom died), a book of any sort flipped open to the fifth page, a ceramic bowl filled with water, a steel knife (both readily available in the Stilinski kitchen), a piece of blank paper, some sort of musical instrument (he snags an old harmonica from his bookcase), a bit of his blood, and a handful of mixed up dried herbs (parsley, sage, rosemary, and - so close! - oregano, all from the spice rack).

It takes all of six minutes for Stiles to pull the components together, and one of those is spent gulping down two glasses of water, because research makes him thirsty.

Then it’s time to do the ritual. Stiles sits down with his back to the window so that the moon can shine on him per the requirements of the spell, and it’s pretty simple to lay everything out on the floor. All he has to do is prick his finger with the knife, focus his energy, and try to make something happen.

He looks at Derek, who is sitting patiently on the other side of the array of odd objects on Stiles’ rug.

Stiles knows he should just get on with it, but once Derek can talk again it’s all going to go back to being complicated - or simple, really, because Derek will go back to being insulting, impetuous, and brooding, and Stiles will go back to being sarcastic at him - and Stiles has never been good at just doing things and not talking, so...

“Look,” he says to Derek, chewing on his lip for a second and fiddling with the handle of the knife. “This has been... This has really sucked for you, but it’s been kind of nice, having you around. I mean, no, not _nice_ \- “ He sits up a little straighter and pretends he didn’t just say something positive and soul-baring to Derek Hale like five minutes before Derek’s going to be able to talk back and tell him how stupid he is. “ - no, just... this hasn’t sucked as much as I thought it would have. You’ve been good to have around. You know, like that time you scared off Mr. Dennison’s chihuahua when he totally was going to bite me. Or when you did that thing with the ball and made Scott laugh so hard he almost passed out. Or...” He doesn’t bring up the cuddling or the licking or the walking together or the way he now feels all warm inside instead of frustrated and kind of scared when he thinks of Derek because of how they’ve gotten closer with everything they’ve shared. He needs to keep it cool. He rubs his palm over his head. “My point is, I’m sorry this is taking so long, I’m sorry you might or might not be turning into an actual dog, and I’m sorry you have this whole fucked up family history that probably makes you being out of control right now feel that much worse. Or maybe it’s better, I don’t know, maybe it’s like a canine vacation for you. Anyway.” Stiles looks up at him again; Derek is just watching him, unreadable. “But you’ve been cool. So thanks for that.”

With that, Stiles shrugs and picks up the knife. He only needs a few drops of blood, but his hands are shaking enough that he gets a steady stream onto the paper, and he has to go get a bandaid for his finger before he can continue with the ritual.

Focusing isn’t one of Stiles’ strongest skills, but he gets himself back into a comfortable cross-legged position, shakes out his jitters, breathes in and out slowly, and thinks about what needs to happen.

_Be the spark_ , he tells himself silently. _Be the spark._

If he does this right, Derek will be able to project his voice into Stiles mind, and that will be creepy but not as much as him not having a voice at all besides the cute little yips and barks he - _okay, Stiles, you’re getting distracted_.

“Be the spark,” he mutters to himself, trying to reach for that same molasses-thick sureness he also didn’t feel when he surrounded the club in mountain ash. He can do this. He can. He’s done it before, and the first time is the hardest, right?

He focuses _hard_ , because this is important, and when his forehead hurts from being scrunched up with determination he tentatively says into the room, “Derek?”

“Stiles?”

Stiles’ eyes fly open, and he gapes at the puppy sitting across from him. “You’re talking to me?” he says, his heart leaping in his chest and his mouth drawing up into a huge smile.

“Of course I’m talking to you,” Derek says from where he’s standing next to Stiles’ bed, all big and glowery and human-shaped.

“Gyah!” Stiles flails backwards in shock, knocking over the candles and the container of spices with his foot, and slams his head hard against the edge of the bookcase.

 

_Whoops..._

“Ow,” Stiles says, clutching at his now-aching head. It isn’t just the injury, though that’s painful enough, but his head is also hurting because _Derek_ is in his room, and he isn’t a _dog_. He looks a little tired and dirty, worn around the edges, and grim as usual, but he is most definitely not a dog.

“It smells like a pizzeria in here,” Derek says, his nostrils flaring. “Is that oregano?”

“Ow,” Stiles says again. He drops his hand and squeezes his eyes shut for a second. “Can I, just for the sake of clarity, assume that you didn’t magically just pop out of this dog but came through the window?”

Derek stares at him, and okay, yeah, that’s creepier than the puppy’s stare, but Stiles can see why everyone was confused. “I came through the window,” Derek tells him.

“Okay,” Stiles says, nodding. He wants to be relieved. He _is_ relieved. Derek is standing there, healthy and non-furry. He looks even better than Stiles remembered. He is totally relieved about that. It’s the _why_ that’s more problematic. “Okay. Good. Great. Not a dog. That’s good. Cool. Okay.”

His eyes widening, Derek looks at the mess of stuff on the floor and then at the puppy, who flaps his tail at him, the traitor. “You thought I was a dog.”

“There was a witch! Remember the witch? The one who disappeared in a puff of smoke at the same time you vanished?” The movement makes his cut finger throb, and Stiles wraps his other hand around it for a moment to try to stop it.

“You’re hurt,” Derek says with a frown, taking a step toward him.

Stiles scrambles to his feet, because the last thing he needs is Derek Hale looming over him. Not that him being upright will stop Derek from looming, but it’ll cut down on the height difference. “I’m fine,” Stiles insists. “The ritual thing needed a little blood.”

Derek’s frown deepens, his jaw clenches, and when he takes another step forward he steps on Derek-the-puppy’s favorite squeaky bone.

They both freeze. Stiles’ breath punches out of him in a soundless, humorless laugh. Derek takes his foot off the bone, and the puppy - who now seriously needs a new name - trots forward and grabs it, retreating to the foot of the bed.

“You did all this for me?” Derek asks, gesturing vaguely at the floor.

“Apparently I did it for a dog,” Stiles says. He feels like he might throw up. Of course the dog wasn’t Derek. Of _course_ it wasn’t.

“A dog you thought was me,” Derek says. He slips his hands in the pockets of his leather jacket and toes thoughtfully at a bright red ball.

Stiles’ face goes hot at what Derek must think of it. “The dog toys were from _Scott_.” He paces a step away and back, trying to take his mind off of the embarrassment and disgust swirling with him. He was so _stupid_.

Derek frowns some more at the ball.

“What do you want, Derek?” Stiles asks. “You’ve been avoiding everyone for almost two weeks, so clearly you want something.”

“I haven’t been avoiding everyone,” Derek says, looking up in surprise. “That witch was a test from the Alpha pack, and Peter and I led them away so we could deal with them.”

“Without us,” Stiles says, his voice flat, because Peter might be a werewolf, but he’s also batshit insane, and it shows how much Derek values the rest of them if that’s who he chooses as his primary ally, uncle or not.

“It seemed better to leave you out of it,” Derek says slowly, like he’s confused by Stiles’ reaction.

“Right,” Stiles says. He starts to pace again. “Great. Thank you. It’s good to know where we all fit in the world.” Which is apparently behind a murderous psychopath.

“Stiles - “

The puppy apparently senses something in Derek’s tone he doesn’t like, because he drops his bone and moves between them, starting to growl at Derek. Stiles doesn’t know whether to laugh at how little a puppy is going to be able to impress an Alpha werewolf or be touched that the dog would try. He guesses they were buddies, after all, even if the dog was just a dog.

“Your dog doesn’t like me,” Derek says.

Stiles shrugs. “Yeah, well.” He wants to make a joke about it making sense because Derek doesn’t like himself, but he’s too angry about being dumb enough to think the puppy was Derek to be able to come up with one. “So are the Alphas gone?”

“Temporarily,” Derek says, drawing into himself the way he does when he’s feeling the burdens of his Alpha-hood. Alpha-dom. Alpha-ness, whatever. “I was hoping if they didn’t get a good look at how new the pack is they’d be more likely to back off.”

“But it didn’t work?” Stiles says, reading between the very obvious lines.

Derek looks like he would rather chew glass than answer, but he admits, “No.”

“Great,” Stiles says with a sigh. “Just great. I guess this really had been a vacation after all.” He just wishes he’d known it was so he could have spent more time sleeping and less time researching spells they obviously didn’t need.

“We’re, um, going to have a meeting about it tomorrow, if you want to come,” Derek says after a moment of awkward silence.

“Sure.” Stiles rubs his nose with the side of his finger and leans back against his desk, which would look a lot smoother if he didn’t slip a little on the candles as he did it.

Derek looks between him and the puppy at his feet, who isn’t growling anymore but whose hackles are still raised in his direction. “You can bring the dog,” he offers.

“Shut up,” Stiles says, but it doesn’t come out that harshly because he’s pretty sure Derek actually means it. “I’ll see you tomorrow for round whatever it is of creepy werewolf politics and the humans who hate them.”

“Okay,” Derek says, and with another glance at the puppy he goes back out the window.

Stiles closes and locks it to save himself any more mortifying visits, and only then does he notice that his phone is lit up with a few missed texts from the past hour.

From Isaac: _Derek’s back, news about the alpha pack, meeting tomorrow night @ 7_

And another: _Bring chips?_

And one from Scott: _i dont know how 2 tell u this but derek isnt a dog_

Clearly Derek visited all of them first. Stiles doesn’t know how to feel about that, although obviously if he were Derek he would have made sure to connect with the other werewolves before he talked to the human sidekick. He should probably be honored Derek came to visit at all.

Of course, it would have been better if Derek hadn’t visited when Stiles was _trying to talk to a dog he thought was Derek_.

Stiles types out quick responses to Isaac and Scott and mutters to Derek-the-puppy-who-needs-a-new-name-and-an-actual-home, “And this is why I should never put my phone on silent.”

And then he gets to work cleaning up the spices, because it really does smell like a pizzeria, all it needs are the scents of melting cheese and rising crusts, maybe some pepperoni and a green pepper or two, and great, now he’s hungry.

 

_And we have another montage of life returning to normal: meetings about the Alpha pack, Derek being glowery and unfairly attractive, Erica and Boyd still being missing, Peter not being any way less creepy, Jackson not being in any way less of a dick, Scott bouncing between the hope of pure and true love and wanting to write depressing poetry about Allison, and so on..._

A week later, Stiles is still feeling the Derek-the-puppy-shaped hole in his life.

It’s not a _Derek_ -shaped hole in his life, because obviously Derek was never in his life to begin with. It was just the puppy. A regular, adorable, slightly weird Husky puppy, who has gone to live with Deaton - He’d taken them bursting in saying “Congratulations, you have a puppy!” surprisingly well, actually, but on the scale of surprises he’s had in his life Stiles guesses this one has to measure pretty low compared to all of the supernatural stuff. - because Stiles had always known he couldn’t keep the dog. His dad would never go for it, and Stiles had thought it was actually Derek, so he’d never expected to have him around long-term.

At least not in puppy shape.

But that doesn’t mean that Stiles isn’t lonely, because he misses having someone to talk to and cuddle with almost like he’s missing a limb, even if said person turned out to be just a dog, and it’s hard for him to have realized so much about Derek - about the losses in his heart, about his need for friends, about the lack of happy, fun things in his life - and tuck them away again because the two of them hadn’t actually been getting closer, even if a lot of the revelations are still valid. The framework around them, of Derek _liking_ Stiles, is gone.

Stiles spends his free time half flopped on his bed watching _Modern Family_ (it’s too soon to fire up _Arrested Development_ again) and half practicing lacrosse shots, going for rambling walks, or jittering out of his mind because it’s two in the morning and he’s stuck inside because he’s smart enough now to know he _shouldn’t_ go for a walk in werewolf-infested woods in the middle of the night, at least not alone. At least he can play video games. And jerk off. Jerking off solves a lot of problems, he finds.

“You should sleep more,” Derek says from beside his window, and Stiles is proud that even if he flails and it’s a near thing for a second he doesn’t actually fall off of his computer chair with the shock. Fortunately he’s watching _Modern Family_ and not porn.

“What are you doing here?” Stiles asks. It’s after midnight, it’s drizzling outside, and Derek is just damp enough that his t-shirt is clinging a little to his very well-built chest, not that Stiles is thinking about that, because he isn’t.

“You hit your head,” is Derek’s reply.

“What? I - “ Stiles gestures to his desk, which he absolutely didn’t hit his head on, since he stayed upright and cool when Derek appeared like a... well, like Derek. “I didn’t hit anything.”

“No, when I interrupted you,” Derek says. “With the dog.” When Stiles doesn’t say anything - because his brain is still processing and because on some level it feels weird that they aren’t all friendly when he still feels like he spent two weeks with Derek living with him - Derek stiffens even further and continues, “I wanted to check on you.”

“That happened like a week ago,” Stiles says.

Derek shrugs.

“And I’ve hit my head a lot of times since you’ve known me,” Stiles reminds him. “Sometimes you’ve even helped with that.”

Derek shrugs again. “Still.”

“I’m fine,” Stiles says slowly, eyeing him and totally unclear about what’s going on. “Thanks.”

“Okay. Good,” Derek says with a little nod. “Because, uh - “ He presses his mouth flat, like this is something he has to work to say. “ - I brought these in case you weren’t.” He pulls a little bottle of painkillers out of his pocket and places it carefully on Stiles’ desk.

Stiles blinks at the small white bottle. It sits there, harmless and utterly mysterious, and offers no answers apart from two to four pills every six to eight hours.

“Thanks?” Stiles offers.

“You’re welcome.” Derek stands there stiffly, watching him.

Before, it would have been unnerving, and Stiles might have been put on the defense or needed to fill the silence, but after living with the canine version of Derek Hale Stiles is more used to it now. He doesn’t have to react. He can just think.

Derek gave him painkillers. Derek came to his house in the middle of the night to check if his head was still hurting and to give him painkillers.

Derek is standing there, his brow furrowed and his eyes dark, looking at him after he climbed through his window after midnight to give him painkillers.

“Oh, my god,” Stiles says as light dawns in his mind. It’s weird light, but it’s light nonetheless. He sits back in his chair in surprise. “You were worried about me!”

“You hit your head,” Derek says, like it’s completely normal for someone to climb into another person’s room in the middle of the night a week later to bring over the counter drugs for a minor injury the hurt person forgot almost immediately. But what does Derek know about human healing? He’s always been a werewolf.

“You weren’t just worried; you were _thinking_ about me!” Stiles doesn’t know what it means, but it clearly means something.

“You hit your _head_ ,” Derek says again, a little more grumpily.

Stiles bounces out of his chair, and he thinks he may be cracking from the strain his life has become, but he doesn’t care. “You,“ he says, pointing at him and poking him in his very firm chest before pulling back his hand really quickly, “were worried about me and thinking about me. And okay, yes, I can see why that would have been a memorable night for you, what with the oregano and the small dog and the overall weirdness. But you were still thinking of me. For a _week_.”

“Stiles,” Derek says warningly, but Stiles has never really cared about listening to that tone of voice, at least not until the threat of bodily harm is involved.

“I don’t know _why_ , I don't know what you're really doing here, but, hey, I’ve got a lot of time on my hands to think about that now that I’m not dogsitting and spending hours trying to figure out a problem that wasn’t actually a problem.” Another thought strikes. “Oh, no wonder that true form spell didn’t work - “ Stiles doesn’t quite hit himself on the forehead, but it’s a close call, because duh, the puppy already was his real canine self. That wasn’t a failure; it was a clue.

“Stiles,” Derek says again, a bit more loudly. His eyes are flashing, not werewolf colors yet or anything, but with emotion he’s having trouble holding back. But then Stiles is used to that, because Derek is frequently annoyed with him, even when Stiles is saving his life.

“That’s my name; don’t wear it out,” Stiles says, not going in for another poke, because he might be feeling a little crazy from all of the emotional upheaval in recent weeks, plus the fact that Derek Hale has brought him a gift - and not even a gift of some sort of dead creature like Lydia’s dog does sometimes, but a real if weird human item - but he doesn’t actually have a death wish.

“Stiles!” Derek snaps out, reaching out and grabbing the front of Stiles’ t-shirt in a tight fist.

Stiles freezes, his eyes going wide and his pulse thundering in a really familiar and almost comfortable way, because this, this makes sense, the angry werewolf and the threat of violence, and how has his life become this, because it was hard enough since he lost his mom, but now it’s just _insane_ , and losing the companionship of the puppy (now named Felix, which honestly isn’t that much better of a dog name than Derek, and he doesn’t know why Deaton didn’t like Schroedinger) has only made him feel more small and _alone_ in this new world of vampires and super powers and -

“Are you ready to listen now?” Derek asks him.

Barely breathing, Stiles nods.

“I,” Derek says, giving him a little shake, his voice low and dangerous, “am saying _thank you_.” 

Stiles thinks for a single, wild moment that Derek is going to wolf out at him (or kiss him, which would be weird and wrong and crazy and hot and _wrong_ ), but Derek just stands there, looking at him, and - _oh_ \- maybe that’s not his dangerous voice but his emotional one.

Struggling to get his brain back online from the kind of distracting threat of violence, Stiles realizes with some surprise that Derek is looking vulnerable and almost soft instead of angry or closed-off like he usually does. Stiles knew Derek had a heart in there - and spending so much time with the dog he thought was Derek made him think a hell of a lot more about what it must mean to _be_ a werewolf whose family was murdered and who has been hunted for much of his life - but Stiles never thought he’d see that heart directed at him.

But there it is, gratitude and wonder and apprehension all wrapped up into one on Derek’s annoyingly perfect face.

Stiles swallows, and he says, “You’re welcome?” It’s definitely not the strongest he’s ever sounded, but he finds he doesn’t mind that much.

Derek’s smile is enigmatic, just a little lift at the corner of his mouth, and he says, probably to clarify, “Thank you for taking me in and trying to save me. Even if it wasn’t me.”

“You don’t have to thank me for that,” Stiles says with a little shake of his head.

Derek lets him go, and he takes a small step backwards. “Yes, I do. Because not everyone would.”

Stiles can see the truth in that statement. Derek’s allies are limited and unreliable; his friends are even fewer. He’s been alone a long time. Stiles might have made a total mess of the puppy situation, but he can see how from Derek’s point of view it was still a huge declaration of concern about him.

“Well, you know. It’s kind of what I do, I guess,” Stiles says.

“I know,” Derek tells him. “You’ve been doing it for a while now.” 

Stiles shrugs, because he has, but until recently it hasn’t been a Derek thing; it’s just been a thing you do when someone’s in trouble and that person happens to be Derek.

Now, though, Stiles realizes, it’s turned into a Derek thing. Like saving Scott is a Scott thing. It’s personal. Because even if the puppy was just a puppy Stiles might sort of understand Derek. He thinks he might actually get him more than he gets Scott, or at least in a different way, because Scott is an open book with not a lot of words - a picture book, maybe, a fairy tale - and Derek is a whole library of books full of complicated thoughts and dark secrets, but Stiles has always liked reading and figuring things out. He’s pretty sure he’s got a small library of his own going at this point.

“You have, too,” he says.

It’s Derek’s turn to pretend it’s not a big deal that he puts himself in between Stiles and danger; he just blinks his acknowledgement. “Sorry about the - “ He gestures at Stiles’ chest where he’d grabbed him. “It seemed like the easiest way to shut you up, but I wasn’t trying to hurt you.”

“You didn’t hurt me,” Stiles tells him. He smooths down his shirt, anyway, but it’s not like it wasn’t already wrinkled. “Jackson’s done worse in the hallways at school.”

“Still.” Derek shrugs. “Sorry.”

Stiles waves a casual hand. “Don’t worry about it. Water totally under the bridge.”

“Okay.”

“We’ll call it even for you _not_ throwing me around when I start in on the dog jokes. I have an endless supply of them, and I’ve been holding back out of respect.”

“Have you.” Derek sounds displeased, but there’s something in his face that Stiles knows means he’s actually amused.

“You have no idea,” Stiles says, settling back into his groove. “It’s been hard.” He slumps into his desk chair and twists back and forth a little. “I’ve got ones about throwing me a bone and wagging the dog and the dog days of summer, and that’s just the start.“

“I think I’m getting the bad end of this deal,” Derek says slowly, but there’s this glint in his eye that Stiles knows - _knows_ down to his toes - means he’s teasing. He just got Derek Hale to tease him. He should put it in the calendar, maybe call his senator and make it a national holiday.

This? Is awesome.

“Derek,” Stiles says contentedly, “I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.” He reaches behind him and grabs a bag from his desk, because it’s late, and he hasn’t eaten in like a half hour. He offers it and a smile in what had become a familiar gesture with the puppy. “Chip?”

Derek looks at the bag for a long moment before reaching out and taking one.

 

_And weirdly enough it isn’t at all weird that Derek hangs out for a while..._

Later, when they’re sitting out on the grass in the backyard under the stars and Derek asks him about what he and the dog did together, Derek seems more than happy to listen while Stiles talks about walking and playing and dominating Scott and battling with Stiles over tennis balls and TV shows. It’s comfortable and easy, and Stiles feels that hole in his chest getting filled back in.

When Stiles has gotten close to talking himself out, Derek finally says, “I like walking in the woods. If you want someone around to keep away any predators. And we could check out that site on the ridge you were talking about."

As warm as the offer makes him feel, Stiles can’t let it go that easily, so he snorts and says, “You can’t just say you want to hang out and go for a walk with me, huh, dude?”

If Derek were the kind of person to squirm, Stiles is absolutely sure he’d be fidgeting like Stiles does when he’s off his meds, but instead his shoulders just get a little more tight. “Fine,” Derek tells him, his mouth pressing flat but his gaze lingering on Stiles like he’s a puzzle to figure out, but not in a bad way. He turns back to look out at the night. “But I’m not kidding about the ridge. And the predators.”

“Yeah, I’ve heard there are a lot of mountain lions around here,” Stiles says with a roll of his eyes. Then he stops for a second. “Wow. Imagine what would happen if there _were_ just a mountain lion. We wouldn’t know what to do with ourselves.”

“It’d be a good problem to have,” Derek says. He sounds almost awed by the thought.

Stiles nods wistfully. “No kidding.”

They talk for a little while longer, Derek loosening up as they do until they’re both leaning back on their elbows, looking up at the night sky, and then Derek blows the peace all to hell by admitting that he’s never seen _Arrested Development_.

“You’ve never seen _Arrested Development_? How can you have never seen _Arrested Development_?” Stiles asks, turning to him in shock. “It’s a classic!”

“I’ve been kind of busy with other things,” Derek says with a shrug, like he had chores to do instead of being hunted by guys with guns for much of his young adult life.

“What about _Doctor Who_?” Stiles asks.

“I think I saw some of Nine,” Derek says, ducking his head with what looks like embarrassment.

“What about _American Idol_?”

“I didn’t grow up _Amish_ , Stiles,” Derek tells him. “Of course I’ve seen _American Idol_.”

Stiles doesn’t stop to acknowledge the hit, though he kind of _loves_ that Derek can show a glint of humor when he pushes back. “Do I even want to ask when you last went to the movies? Or the _mall_? Or anything else fun?”

“Probably not.”

“We are going to fix that,” Stiles tells him. “All of it. You have a lot to catch up on.”

Derek nods and shifts a bit, which leaves their shoulders touching like it doesn’t mean anything about boundaries and comfort levels. It’s nice. “I know.”

Stiles’ mind ticks through the two hundred and fifty things he can think of off of the top of his head that Derek probably never had the opportunity to do, didn’t know that he wanted to, or has bad memories about that need to be cleared away. “We might have to make a list.”

His thoughts flit to the fact that he’s never been able to go back to that haunted hayride since his mom died, because she always held his hand through the whole thing and never let go, although at this point college kids dressed up in costumes with rubber masks is so far from scary it’s laughable.

Still, maybe he could go now, especially with someone who might feel pretty much the same way, like it’s a luxury to have the scary things be so simple. Scott would scream when people jumped out, no matter that he’s a werewolf, and he’d get that kicked puppy face if Stiles got sad. but Derek would get it, even if Stiles doesn't tell him why they're there.

(In the darkest depths of his mind, Stiles is aware that he will scream, too, and probably jump and flail, and maybe run, but he isn’t going to admit it.)

“We’ll put some stuff for me on there, too,” Stiles says, like it’s not a big deal at all.

“Okay,” Derek says simply, and Stiles looks over at him, unable to stop himself from smiling again, because yeah. This is going to be even better than having Derek the dog around. Scott will always be his best friend, but Stiles needs this, too. He really does.

“Okay,” Stiles replies, and he feels his chest loosen enough that he can take a deep, calm breath as he tips his head up and looks at the stars.


End file.
